Abstract Writing Guide

Abdul Razak Hussain

Faculty of Information and Communication Technology
Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka
April 2008

Abstract
Conveying important and accurate information about your report in a concise yet
complete manner is becoming more and more important as readers are inundated with
numerous publications. This article briefs about the purpose of abstracts and provides
essential elements that a good abstract should have. This functional check list can be
used to guide the abstract writing process. Several equally important non-functional
considerations are also highlighted. Together, the functional and non-functional
considerations may increase the acceptability of an intended publication.

Introduction
Many good project reports go unnoticed, unaccepted or unpublished simply because of
the badly written abstracts. Given the number of papers or reports to review within a
specified time, reviewers would based their selection on good abstracts. Writing a good
abstract so that the readers are 'hooked' to get hold of the entire report can be a very
challenging task – sometimes even demanding than writing the report itself. A good
abstract is like a good commercial; it 'sells' a report just like a product brochure promotes
a product.

What An Abstract Should Be

An abstract primarily serves as a outline or a map of your work – what you have done or
propose to do. Not only it summarizes your report, but also it convinces the reader that the
entire report is worth reading and holds valuable information. There are two types of
abstract – descriptive and informative (refer Table 1).

Table 1: Types of abstract

Descriptive Informative
Conveying general information about Conveying specific information of the
Purpose the contents or the organisation of report.
the report.
Very short – short. From few sentences Short. From a paragraph to several
Length
to a paragraph. pages.
“This report also highlights the “This report concludes that mobile
Sample conclusion and recommendations game devices are 80% more
sentences from the study on the prevalence of prevalent among city teenagers
mobile game devices”. compared to city adults”.

An abstract also serves as a check-point for the report's author himself. It mentally
challenges the author to condense the entire report into several accepted elements.
These elements are explained in the following Table 2.
 Table 2: Functional elements of an abstract
Element Function
Explains the importance of
Motivation / your work. Use one or two
Background sentences putting the
current work in context.
Purpose / Aim / Explains the purpose of
Problem Statement the work.
Explains what was done
Method /
(or proposed) in solving
Approach
the stated problems.
Explains the findings or
Results
observations.
Explains the consequence
Conclusions
or implication of the work.
Other Non-functional Considerations
Besides making sure that your abstract contains the essential elements, you may want to
consider the these do s and don't s when writing an abstract (Table 3):
Sample questions to ask

Why does this topic deserve my
involvement?

Why should I be bothered about
this at all?

Why is this topic considered
difficult or interesting?

If these problems can be solved,
what are the impacts or
consequences?

Is this current work part of a larger
scope of work?

What are the problems I am trying
to solve?

What is the scope of my work? Is it
for a specific situation or for a
more generalized situation?

Do I follow certain standard
procedures or techniques? Why
do you choose them?

Do I use simulation, observation,
case study, prototype or other
analysis?

What are the variables,
constraints or measurements?

How do I measure the expected
outcomes?

How can I interpret the
outcomes?

Can I verify them?

What do the results mean? Do
they prove or disapprove
something?

Is there an improvement of
degradation? How much?

Will my work lead to new
possibility?
 Table 3: Non-functional considerations

Do s
Use keywords of the report in the abstract.
Use simple language to cater for a wider audience.
Follow the word count requirements.
Follow the chronology of the report.
Be coherent. Provide logical transitions among the elements.
Summarize your report/work. Be concise – choose the right words.
Revise your draft to fix grammatical or spelling errors.
Don't s
Avoid beginning with “This paper...” or “This report...”. Focus on the research work.
Do not include (over-emphasized) the general introductory or historical background.
Do not add information which is not included in the report.
Do not include references, tables or figures unless necessary.
Avoid the use of acronyms, abbreviations or symbols, unless previously stated.

Avoid using “I” or “We”. Instead, use “The study implemented...”.

Avoid wordiness. Make use of the thesaurus/dictionary for better words.

Conclusion
Writing a good abstract definitely requires concentration and dedication. It may seem
tedious, but worth all the efforts. By getting all the elements, including the non-functional
considerations, into your abstract, you are increasing the chances of your paper or report
getting accepted for publication.

Further Reading
[On-line] Merriam-Webster Dictionary. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary (Last accessed:
21 April 2008)
[On-line] Writing Abstracts, Colorado State Univ.
http://writing.colostate.edu/guides/documents/abstract/ (Last accessed: 23 April 2008)
[On-line] Writing an Abstract, Univ. of Adelaide.
http://www.adelaide.edu.au/clpd/lls/download/Writing%20an%20abstract.pdf (Last accessed: 21
April 2008)
[On-line] How to Write an Abstract, Univ. California Berkeley.
http://research.berkeley.edu/ucday/abstract.html (Last accessed: 21 April 2008)
[On-line] Writing an Informative Abstract, American Sociological Association.
http://www.asanet.org/page.ww?section=Journals&name=Writing+an+Informative+Abstract (Last
accessed: 23 April 2008)